Installing windows on Point of Sale register

[MikeRepairs]

I am reinstalling windows (Win XP Pro OEM) on a Javelin Viper 2.5 Point of Sale register. I just replaced a failed HD. It has no CD Rom or Floppy. It cannot boot from USB so I am not able to use my external USB drive.

I would like to format the drive while it is attached to a USB adapter on another PC. I would then copy the windows CD to a temporary directory. Is there a way to make it autoload windows install upon bootup? Any ideas on that? What kind of boot loader could I use?

I bet they usually do this with a acronis or ghost image, but I do not have an image of this system. It has a Win XP Pro OEM COA sticker on it.

Thanks for any help.

[MikeRepairs]

This worked :)

This was copied from a topic here:

installing XP on a desktop or laptop with no diskette or cdrom drive

To install XP on cd-less/diskette-less desktop or laptop.

You have a laptop or desktop that lacks diskette and cdrom drives. You want to install windows XP on it, but can't without either a diskette or cdrom drive attached to it. Here's what to do:

1) install the hard drive as a slave in a working desktop system with a cd/dvd drive. Attach it to an available ide channel. If the hard drive comes from a laptop, you'll need a 44-pin female to 40-pin male laptop to ide adapter.

2) Format the drive. Quick or full NTSF format.

3) insert your windows XP install cd in the cd/dvd drive. When the initial install window pops up, exit.

4) Go to “My Computer” and look up and write down the drive letters of the CD/DVD containing the XP install disc and the drive letter of the hard drive you are installing to.

5) Assuming the hard destination drive is “D” and the XP install disc is in “E:”, go to the run command and type (or cut and paste) the following line:

E:\I386\winnt32.exe /syspart: D: /tempdrive: D: /makelocalsource /noreboot (remove the space between ”: D”, without the space it's the code for the Big Grin smiley)

6) setup will begin and ask you if you want to upgrade or full install, make sure it is FULL INSTALL. It will then ask you for a few more things including the product key. Enter the product key.

7) When it's done installing all of the required files to the destination drive, the command window will exit and your back to your desktop.

VERY IMPORTANT step if you want the drive letter to appear as C:\ on the PC you are going to put the drive in:
Before removing the drive from the Master PC.
Go to D:\$WIN_NT.~BT\ and delete the MIGRATE.INF file.
If you skip this step, your Windows partition will stay as D:\ or whatever drive letter appeared on the other PC.

Turn off your Desktop and remove the slave/destination hard drive. The drive is now ready for install on the new system. Install the drive back into the laptop or desktop you wanted to install XP on and boot. It will simply continue to install windows from this point without requiring any diskette or cd/dvd drive.

Since the destination laptop or desktop does not have a diskette drive, you will not be able to add third party drivers via F6. Also, I don't know if a slipped streamed install disc will work. But it does work off an oem disc.

[Winston_Smith]

I'd suggest a PXE install, there might be other ways but this is the only method I've done myself before.

Here's a guide that should give you a pretty good idea of how it's done, of course you'll need to make sure the computer can PXE boot.

Windows XP PXE Install (http://www.lockstockmods.net/2008/04/26/easy-way-to-pxe-boot-windows/)

[MikeRepairs]

This was a critical part I missed, so I had to do it again:

VERY IMPORTANT step if you want the drive letter to appear as C:\ on the PC you are going to put the drive in:

Before removing the drive from the Master PC.
Go to D:\$WIN_NT.~BT\ and delete the MIGRATE.INF file.
If you skip this step, your Windows partition will stay as D:\ or whatever drive letter appeared on the other PC.

http://www.beyondweblogs.com/post/How-to-install-Windows-XP-without-CDDVD-Floppy.aspx